


Father's Day

by Lightspeed



Category: Team Fortress 2
Genre: Abandonment, Accidental Matricide, Accidental Patricide, Adoption, Angst, Comfort, Daddy Issues, Divorce, Family, Father Figures, Father's Day, Gen, Holidays
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-07
Updated: 2013-10-07
Packaged: 2018-01-03 10:45:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,309
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1069542
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lightspeed/pseuds/Lightspeed
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Scout’s first Father’s Day on-base, unable to see and be with his family, leaves him too much time to reflect on his father’s depature, and his hatred and hurt regarding it.  He turns to the one man on base who might understand what it’s like to resent but love a lost father: Demoman.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Father's Day

When Demoman found the door to his quarters hanging open, it has raised an eyebrow. His stroll back from breakfast had been far less bleary-eyed than the walk to, but he was certain he hadn't left his door open upon venturing outside. When he heard quiet sniffles coming from inside, it was all the more cause for worry. But when he looked inside to find Scout curled up on his bed, clutching an old stuffed animal and trying very hard to keep the big, fat tears that welled in his eyes from falling, the Scotsman understood everything.

He'd forgotten what day today was. It was Father's Day.

It had been hard the first few years, dealing with the notion of a holiday that no longer applied to him, but in time, he'd grown used to the silence, used to its absence, to the point where he had to be reminded of its existence when it rolled around each year. Normally, it was his mum, lamenting the loss of her beloved husband and taking solace in the beautiful son they had created together, spending her time with him and reminiscing.

But this year, furlough did not allow such things, though a holiday ceasefire helped soften the load. He made a note to give his mum a call later on to check up on her.

It was never so much an afterthought for Scout.

"Scout?" Demoman ventured, stepping tentatively into his own quarters like he was the one trespassing. He closed the door quietly behind him, locking it against interruptions. They were both going to need time.

A loud, wet sniff ripped through the room as Scout realized he was no longer alone, and sat up suddenly, stuffing the plush toy behind his back like he'd been caught with a porno magazine. He scrubbed at his eyes to try and eliminate the evidence and smiled sheepishly at Demoman. "Oh, uh, hey Demo. What's up?"  
  
"What's up is you're in me room, boyo," the Scotsman explained, somewhat authoritative if nonchalant. He did his best to appear larger, looming a bit over the smaller man as he approached the bed and stood there, trying to keep his expression unreadable. He wanted to give the poor thing a hug and tell him everything was okay, but he had just invaded his space, and he had to at least put on a show of things. His act quickly crumbled, however, as he saw the young man's red nose and wet eyes and the heaving gulping breaths he took as he tried to steady himself.

"I, uh, I'm sorry, man, I just," Scout took a breath to organize his swimming thoughts, "I kinda needed to talk to ya. In private. I-- I can leave, if--"

"Nae, don't worry about it, lad," Demoman assured him, taking a seat beside the slim American. "You alright?"

Scout sighed. There was no way the older man hadn't seen him crying, curled up hugging a stuffed animal like a little kid. He'd been on the guy's bed doing it, for fuck's sake. His head bowed, and he tugged the toy out from behind himself. It was a ragged, faded teddy bear with threadbare arms and a nose that was once covered in felt, but had been scuffed away to the bare plastic it had concealed. He wrapped his arms around the torso of the thing, leaning his chin on the crown of its head, between two ears, the tips of which had been rubbed clean of fur. Demoman could catch glimpses of where the toy folded, where time had yet to touch its fur so nearly, where a golden brown hue still lingered where the rest of the thing had taken on a greyish tone. It was old, it was ratty, and it was well-loved. He couldn't help but smile as he compared it to himself a little. It still had both brown eyes, though one was scratched, a white scar across its plastic pupil.

"I, uh, I'm sorry. I just. Father's day, yanno?"

"I ken. It's hard for me, too," the older man confessed, pulling his legs up onto the bed and letting his shoulders slump.

"I'm just havin' some trouble. I always do, but this is the first time I been on base for it since we got here."

"Aye, same. I'd be at home with mum today otherwise."  
  
"Same. Me, my brothers, we all try an' do something for Ma to cheer her up. We do like a second Mother's day instead. I been showin' the others up the past few years an' payin' for us all to go out do dinner. Maybe they won't look so bad now, huh?"

Demoman chuckled lightly at that, "Mum would kill me if I took her out. These are your prime earning years, son! Don't go throwing away money on frivolous dinners! I want a wee bit o' mutton and some mash and that's fine."

"Anythin' to keep her mind off it, huh?"

"Aye. And mine, too. I miss him. We both do."

"Dunno if I feel the same way."

"Ye don't miss yer da?"

"Kinda. But not like you, man. My pop, he... He didn't go an' die on us, man. He just up and left one day. He has eight kids with Ma, raises all of 'em, but one day, he decides it's too much, and instead 'a takin' me to the ballpark like he said he was gonna, he got in his car an' left."

"Not a word?"

"Oh, there was plenty 'a words. 'Bout how he was workin' his fingers to the bone to feed ten mouths, how Ma was a bitch an' how she ruined his life gettin' knocked up so they had to get hitched. Real martyr shit. Up on the cross all fuckin' week, and then Saturday rolls around, an' he grabs his suitcase an' his hat, says goodbye to me an' my brothers, not a word to Ma, an' catches a bus."

Scout's quiet sniffling was all that filled the silence following, stretching long and yawning into the quiet desert morning.

"It's just," he finally resumed, "what kind of fucking asshole does that? Fathers eight kids and then one day decides he didn't want any of it to start but just kept going along with it, and then fucks off? When I was growing up, he never showed any 'a that. He was a dad, man! Taught us how to fight, how to play ball, took us places, kept us fed and clothed. Then one day, you're just a nuisance. How many 'a those ball games that we went to were just him goin' through the motions? How many 'a my memories 'a fun times with my Pop are nothin' but a freakin' joke?"

Demoman's arm slinked around the smaller man's waist, pulling him closer as he spoke. He could feel Scout shaking. Everywhere, he trembled and quaked, like his very form was ready to give out, to transmute spontaneously into liquid and pour out on the floor, a creature of animate tears and no remaining substance, simply a puddle of grief incarnate. A warm, rough hand found its way to the smaller man's forearm, gripping him gently and rubbing small circles along paler flesh with the pad of his thumb.

"How much of what meant everything to me meant nothin' to him, man? I worshiped him! He was my pop! An' he probably couldn't stand me! Or any of us! So he just left! I was only eight, man! How the fuck do you handle that as an eight year-old? Sorry, Scooter, but Pops ain't takin' you to the ball game because he never loved you or any of us and he's never comin' back!"

The rising volume of Scout's wobbling voice broke with a loud, agonized sob, his shaky facade crumbling as he doubled over the bear in his arms. Demoman tugged him closer, letting the boy lean on him as he struggled, shuddering, trying to choke back tears and wails that hammered at him, eroding away at his internal levees with years of resentment finally risen past flood levels.

"Ye have good memories to start with, though, and those matter," Demoman ventured, hand moving to rub slow circles on Scout's back. "He said goodbye to ye and yer brothers, which means that no matter his quarrel with yer mum, ye still mattered to him, too," he tried to reassure.

"Yeah?" Scout sounded wholly unconvinced, wondering where the hell this line of reasoning was headed.

"People do stupid things. Parents. They do stupid things, lad. Wholly unnecessary things. Painful things. Childish, selfish, confusing things. But even when they're so in the wrong, so self-absorbed, it doesn't always mean you're not on their minds, if that makes any sense," he explained, his voice gentle, soothing.

"Not much, no."  
  
"Let me give ye an example, right? Me mum and da --me real mum and da-- they gave me up for adoption at birth."

"But why? Ain't your family, like, royalty or somethin'?" Scout asked, quivering subsiding and giving way to curiosity.

"Aye, that we are. The DeGroots are a long, proud line of noble highlands demomen. And when I say noble, I dunnae mean admirable or moral. But there's a long-standing tradition amongst the highlands demomen. When a child is born, he is given up by his parents, and raised by others. I was lucky. I was adopted by a couple. Sweet, loving people who made a good home for me, had me working hard at an early age like a proper Scot. But the blood was strong in me, lad. I had a fancy for explosives that wouldn't rest, and an eye for the supernatural long before I had a supernatural eye," he chuckled, hugging Scout close as the younger man rolled his eyes at the terrible joke.

"Nae, but seriously. It was the loch that ruined the happy home I had as a lad. The monster within, not many stateside believe in her, but I've seen her. I've seen Nessie with me own eyes --back when I could speak in plural-- and she was a beast of malevolence, tamed only by her relative isolation. But I was a clever lad, but not quite that sort of clever. I planned to destroy the monster, to blow her to bits."

"You planned to blow up the Loch Ness Monster?" Scout asked, confusion overriding the lingering strains of heartache, his voice growing more steady.

"Aye. But I didn't just plan. I tried! I dinnae succeed."

"What happened?"  
  
"I dinnae even get the bomb to the water. Or out 'o the house. I messed up the timing mechanism; I was just a wee lad. I went upstairs to get me wheelbarrow to take it with me, and on the way, I heard the blast. Demolished our house to the ground. Nothing survived. Nobody survived." Demoman swallowed hard, a hard knot of regret twisting in his gut. He did not like reliving what he'd done.

"You..."

"Killed me parents, aye."

"Aw jeez, Demo, I'm so sorr--"

"Nothin' to be done about it, it's past. Those memories hurt, but not for lack of love or adoration from me adopted mum and da. They're in a better place, without the scent of brimstone whiffing up from their basement."

"So what happened?"

"I ended up back in the orphanage, where I began me sorry tale. Not long after, word of me explosives habit got to the DeGroots, and me real mum and da came, got me, and taught me the family trade proper, like they'd always been there and nothing had been unusual. Just like me da's parents had done to him."

"Weren't you angry?"

"Bloody right I was angry! How dare they abandon me! How dare they leave me to learn the trade on me own, and destroy two beautiful innocent lives in the process! How dare they break my heart over something as petty as tradition!" Demoman deflated, sinking in against Scout. "But they loved me, boy. They loved me and I was their own, and me mum, she still loves me. Me da, he said to the day he died he was proud 'o me."

"But how can you look back on that and be happy? How can you not hate him for all of that?"

"I do, sometimes. But I also look at the good times, the smiles, the learning, the joy we shared, and that matters just as much. Sometimes, it matters more. They shape you just as much as the bad things do, but they also keep ye movin' forward."

"So yer tellin' me to forget it all and forgive him?"

"Nae, don't ye dare forgive the bastard for walkin' out on yer family! Forgiveness is what cowards do when they can't settle a score. I'm tellin' ye to appreciate what little good there was, to remember that, and all of the rest, let it shape ye. But don't let it break ye. Let it give ye direction, and never be that man yerself. Be a better man than he ever was, ever will be."

"Thanks, Demo," Scout chuckled, leaning his forehead against the older man's jaw. His skin was warm, and his mutton chops tickled at his hairline. "I can definitely say I ain't so upset anymore. That's some serious fatherly advice."

"If that's the least I can do, it's something, aye?"

"Yeah." The creasing of the smaller man's forehead and raising of his brows told the bomber Scout was looking up at him. "Hey, uh, I hope it goes without sayin' that if you tell anyone I got a teddy bear, I'm gonna gut you like a trout, right?"

"I wouldn't expect any less 'o ye, lad," Demoman chuckled, patting him gently between the shoulder blades and giving him a squeeze.

**Author's Note:**

> requested by Tumblr user pyroness


End file.
